WATCH out for lookalike Vicky Pollards, 'laydees' Florence and Emily, and even 'only gay in the village' Dafydds at Little Britain Live extravaganza, if crowds at earlier shows on the sell-out tour are anything to go by.

Even more than the cartloads of awards and record DVD sales, it's that sort of devotion, and the catchphrases that get endlessly repeated in school playgrounds across the land, that shows just how far David Walliams and Matt Lucas have penetrated the national consciousness.

"It's like driving a car when the brakes have gone. You're still steering but you're not in control anymore.

"The programme's not ours now," Walliams observed recently, adding though, that "I think it's wonderful that you've got 10-year-old boys running around school playgrounds calling out 'I'm a laydee' or 'I'm the only gay in the village'.

"We celebrate difference.

Expectations

"The level of success has far exceeded our expectations," he admits. "But what I've realised is that it's not us who've mad it a hit, it's the public. Once they like and start talking about something, a certain magic happens."

The duo first met as teenagers when they were both involved in the National Youth Theatre.

They met again at Bristol University and began working on sketches together, which eventually formed the basis of a show they took, like thousands have before them, to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival.

"Me and David did some crazy stuff on stage when we first started working together in the mid-nineties, quite anarchic stuff," Lucas recalls. "We were young and fearless.

"We used to perform at the festival at midnight and we had all sorts of hecklers, but we always took them on!"

"It was our shared love of television comedy that brought us together and, first and foremost, we're fans," he says.

"Even if we weren't working in the medium, we'd still be watching it."

Publicity

Neither of them particularly enjoy the glare of publicity and laugh at the notion that there seems to be some value in pictures of them doing quite ordinary, everyday things, like walking along the road "unless a car suddenly mounted the pavement!", chuckles Walliams.

But, reassuringly, they've introduced new characters into the stage show and promise more in the new TV series.

"Most comedians have their moment and ours is happening right now," Lucas sagely observes. "The trick is to enjoy it before fashion moves on."

Little Britain returns to the Apollo on February 3, 4, 10, 11 and 12 and March 13, 14, 15, 16, 17 and 18, 2006. Tickets for the show are priced é15-é24.50. They will then return for one last time on Wednesday, May 10. Tickets cost é24.50 and é27.50. Call 0870 060 1768 orbook online.To check availability, call 0870 060 1768 or visit the website below.